Game Clocks, Levels, and Being Tough

So last night: Magpied a while, realized that I’m WAY overleveled for a lot of that now (level six rotfiend nest? Pfft!) then got on with Count Reuven. Did the bit with Triss in which she was tortured, and then killed Menge, which a) pleased me and b) surprised me. Didn’t see that coming.

So how’d you play that? I went all stone cold and let her be tortured. Why? Cuz the last time an NPC from my past said “Trust me, leave me alone, it’ll be cool” I didn’t do it, and, in so doing, fucked his plan up. So I THINK I did the right thing. Still sucked.

Glad she killed that fucker, though.

So now he’s dead, and I’m at “Find a way out of the compound” or something. And she’s back in her silly clothes cuz that’s another setting the patch changed.

Are we really going to have to people call someone Dudu with a straight face for the rest of this game?

Feminina:

Yeah, that was how I wound up feeling about the question marks…that’s when I decided I was just going to magpie for a while, take care of every question mark I could see before they all became stupidly low level for me.

So, I MEANT to let Triss be tortured, not liking it but thinking, like you, that since she said she knew what she was doing, I should trust her on that, but then I made one too many smart remarks to the guards at the gate and they attacked me instead of letting me in with my ‘prisoner.’ Oops. So we just killed everyone. Including Menge, but not as any sort of dramatic payback, just because he was there trying to kill us too. And set his house on fire, which was satisfying. Triss said something like “subterfuge isn’t your strong point, is it?” but at least she wasn’t chiding me for not trusting her, just for not being able to keep a civil tongue in my head. Which actually goes well with my refusal to bow to the emperor earlier…I just can’t play these social games! Don’t ask me to!

And yeah…”Dudu.” That’s something they could profitably have changed while translating from the Polish. Could’ve been pretty much anything else, really. Mumu. Bubu. Even Tutu. Or Dodo! Even Dodo would be better! But no, everyone has to spend time talking perfectly seriously about Dudu. It’s almost worse than “Count Dooku,” which is pretty awful.

Butch:

The question marks are either level six rot fiends or fifteen foot tall death bugs. You can never tell.

If we ever have to talk our way into someplace, a restaurant say, or a better rental car, do us a favor and do not speak.

So did you find out where dandelion was? Cuz I learned that while triss was being tortured.

It’s too bad you missed that cuz it was an interesting twist on a damsel in distress. Here’s a damsel saying “don’t save me,”. And you have several opportunities to say fuck it, I’ve had enough, I’m going to save her, but to get the most out if it, and her respect, you have to not save the damsel. Who turns out ok. She sure kills the fuck out if menge. Even in that outfit. When you say “let me tend your wounds” she says, sarcastically, “it’ll heal by my wedding day.”

How are we gonna do in depth analysis if you just keep killing everyone? (T SHIRT!)

Feminina:

Yes, I still got the info about Dandelion…it was in Menge’s notes, I think, when I searched his room. I didn’t get to (/have to) not save the damsel, but I still got what I needed. I do wonder if I might have gotten more information about the treasure if I’d actually talked to Menge…did he tell you anything about where it was? I found a key, but no indication of where the relevant lock is.

Butch:

Ah, see, I should have asked. I had a white dialog for “I wanted to ask about a treasure….” While triss was being tortured but I didn’t do it cuz I was soft selling it. I didn’t want him to put two and two together. So I picked the “I’ll give you info on Phillips for dandelion,” which was yellow, and never got to go back.

I, too, have the key.

Speaking of which I stumbled across a level 20 quest in an alley. Can we come back to novigrad to mop up after skellege?

Feminina:

Yeah, Mr. O’ went off to Skellige and then came back later and did a lot of mopping up. Maybe we get cut off from coming back once we get to a certain point, but it must be pretty close to the endgame–he was hopping back and forth for a long time.

Speaking of going back, I never have gotten around to going back to White Orchard to find that guarded treasure in the swamp. I should do that one of these days. Even though I’m sure the treasure is 2 florins and a broken rake. Plus a nice pair of gloves that would have been good to have 12 levels ago.

Butch:

Ok, good. Cuz I’m looking at the quest log, which is now full of red quest in novigrad and an increasing number of green quests in Skellege, and thinking “This…does not add up.”

It may well be an empty victory. At the time, I was only hoping you had done it so we could talk on the whole “water hags spray stuff on the screen” mechanic. We’ve been there, we’ve done that.

But speaking of mechanics, I did get to try out one of those stash points last night, and I approve. That and the whole “greyed out when you’ve read it” bit. But what DIDN’T help was that they don’t grey out things you’ve read when they’re being sold to you. So I was at a merchant, and he had this drawing, and it wasn’t grey! So I bought it for 14. And read it. And it was something I had sold him before. For 1.

Sigh.

Feminina:

Wait, it doesn’t gray out things you’ve read in a merchant’s stock? Must apply only to documents…I definitely used the gray/non-gray to determine which books to buy, and they were all ones I hadn’t read. I will have to be wary of documents held by merchants, though. Good tip.

The markets here really favor the merchants, don’t they? I don’t want to keep books, so I always sell them right back after I’ve read them, and invariably have to buy them for 60 and then sell them for 5.

Ooh, also, I accidentally hit “I need a loan” last time I went to change money at the bank, and had to borrow 100 (no option to back out of the transaction). I immediately repaid it, and owed 130. That’s some pretty sweet interest, Mr. usurious dwarf. The system is not set up to enrich the poor traveling witcher, that’s for sure.

So be careful about those dialogue options.

Butch:

Not that I noticed. And it was one of those drawings from the godling/dreamer bit, so it looked important, so I bought it.

Good lord the exchange rate sucks. Seriously. No wonder there are so many peasants.

Feminina:

Speaking of mechanics again (sort of), it feels like we must be somewhere around the halfway point now, doesn’t it? I’m not basing that on anything except a vague sense of narrative momentum, but that would be my estimate. We shall see.

Butch:

I feel that way, too. That and the level. Mr. O’ was, what, 33 or so? And I’m about to hit 16? Or just did?

Usually, that’s a good judge.

Feminina:

Yeah, I think low 30s. He mentioned that it gets harder and harder to advance levels as you get higher, so that at one point he said “I’m never going to get to 35!” He may have gotten there by now, though–although he hasn’t really been playing since he finished the story. He bought the expansion, but it’s not out until October. So really, if it takes us another couple of months to finish, we’ll be able to move right into the expansion with no break!

Meanwhile, no competition for the console of an evening, until he finds something else to play.

Butch:

Funny. I felt levels 7 through about 11 took forever and then 12-16 was fast as hell. Maybe it’ll slow when I get back to magpie. I have a feeling there’ll be a whole new crop of 21 Xp question marks in skellege.

Fallout 4 dude. That’s what’s next. I did 80 hours in 3, 75 more in Vegas. I won’t be surprised if 4 is 100 or more. Big games these days. These dudes did skyrim remember?

Feminina:

It must slow down again, because I agree, it felt like a crawl to work up to about 10 or 11 and since then it’s been a lot faster. I just got to 19 the other night and it was more like “oh, another level already?” than “yay! I finally made it!”

But maybe once we run out of these 10-ish level quests, they’ll get a lot harder and it will be more of a long haul again.

Speaking of game time…I think that TW3 doesn’t count Nate’s and my games separately after all, so I have no clue how long I’ve been playing. Also, there are a number of forum complaints that the clock is inaccurate…apparently it keeps counting even if you put the console on ‘rest’ mode? Or something?

Anyway, point is I’m not going to have a good idea about the time on this one. Although I guess once I finish I can roughly halve the total, since Mr. O’ and I both tend to try to do pretty much everything, so it should be about the same.

Butch:

Yeah. I felt like I was about level 8 forever, and now, I agree, it’s “Where am I going to put all these ability points?”

Perhaps it’ll slow down. Or it’ll be these main quests. Cuz I figure I’ll do what you did: get through the mains (which give far more XP) then go back to gwent (I mean, contracts, etc.). (I did finish the “big city players” last night. Got an AMAZING card. That dude in Oxenfurt’s DOOMED.)

And yeah, my game clock makes no sense. It seemed to reset at some point. Or it gets confused with save slots. I mean, I use all ten of mine, and I’m always just taking the most recent, so maybe it thinks that some other dude in the house just seems to skip around? I dunno. I figure….lots of hours. Certainly over 50 or so thus far.

It’s a lot. A lot a lot. I feel like it’s going to end up being more time than any other I’ve done, which would top the 105 in DAO.

Feminina:

So true–a lot of the smaller quests are pitiful for XP. I swear I did one where I got 2. So yeah, once we work through the plot-central bits, there will be a lot of not-very-XP-heavy stuff to do.

It’s going to be a lot of time. Which is why it’s too bad the clock doesn’t calculate it accurately, because one would like to actually know how much time, exactly. Oh well. I’ll settle for “a lot.”

Butch:

Or “A whole hell of a lot.”

I certainly don’t feel cheated.

Feminina:

No, I don’t feel cheated. Heck, it could end tomorrow and we’d have gotten our money’s worth in terms of play time and discussion fodder.

I mean, I WOULD feel cheated if it ended tomorrow, because there’s no way the ending would make any sense and it would be a shame to have it end badly after so much good stuff earlier on, but in terms of sheer amount of game, we’ve gotten $60 worth already.

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About Feminina O'Ladybrain

As a woman, Feminina O'Ladybrain loves skimpy armor, the Smurfette Principle, and being rescued. She also enjoys setting things on fire, and is unusually fond of shotguns.
She likes lady games, such as 'Lady: The Game,' but since that doesn't exist, she plays a lot of series, like 'Dragon Age,' 'Mass Effect,' and 'Assassin's Creed.'